Reply To: General Discussion
Basiru,
I agree with your analysis regarding the synergy between learning and teaching and vice-versa. We all know as professors that each semester that you teach, you end the semester learning something new about yourself as the professor, and about your approach to teaching. Personally, this has been my experience for several years, leading me to adopt a strategy which has worked for me. At the beginning of each semester, I do not fail to assure my students that it is true I stand in front of them as their professor to teach them but in reality, they teach me more than I teach them. This helps establish a good rapport with them. Some of course, are surprised to hear me say that, but explain to them using a simple mathematical fact to start which is: I am one person, one-brain and there is many of them, and that they come from different racial, cultural and religious backgrounds, and it’s just me. And throughout the semester, some of the teaching approach I use to explain specific French grammatical skills may not work for some learners. I have to learn different ways to get these students understand the lesson, increase their class participation, and thus do well during the tests. There are several instances of such happenings and at the end of the semester, I realize a change in me. I feel good about myself for being malleable and not insisting on using tools that did work for those students.
